


Freezing in a Cow Field

by shittystorywriter



Category: South Park
Genre: Fluff, Friendship/Love, Love Confessions, M/M, Romance, Sappy, Winter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-25
Updated: 2017-07-25
Packaged: 2018-12-06 17:12:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11605158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shittystorywriter/pseuds/shittystorywriter
Summary: Stan makes Kyle go out in the middle of a freezing night for something that is a surprise.





	Freezing in a Cow Field

It's 12:38 on a Friday night and I'm lying in my bed, waiting for a certain someone to text me. I eventually hear my phone vibrate, and sleepily pick it up.

 _Stan_ : OK, you still awake?

"Yup" I immediately text back.

 _Stan is typing..._ "k, meet me by the abandoned water station."

I yawn, typing back "OK," before lazily rolling out of bed. I turn my phone off and throw it under my bed. I yawn again, before putting my boots on and grabbing my jacket. It's dark in my bedroom, and everyone in my house is asleep. I don't want to wake them up, so I try to quietly tiptoe down the hall. Once I reach the staircase, I inch my way down the stairs, carefully trying to avoid making the old wood squeak.

Now I'm in the living room. I put my coat on and make my way to the door. I open it very slowly, feeling the icy cold air hit me in the face. It sends shivers through me as I step out into the midnight air. Stan is my best friend, so I didn't want to say no to him, but I'm pretty bummed out by this spontaneous middle of the night plan, which he says is a surprise. I close the door very carefully before locking it, and then lightly crunch down the icy driveway, heading into the street.

It's early February. The air is so dry and bitter that I feel my nose burning. I quicken my pace, wanting to know what Stan felt was so important on a cold night like this. It's eerily silent all around. Even the farm field I pass by is empty, with the cows sleeping in their barns.

I keep on walking briskly, freezing my balls off. I eventually reach another field and hop over the old wood fence, heading through some icy looking trees. I head down a little path between the trees that leads to an opening in the field, where the old building is. It's the little brick shell of an abandoned water pump station, supposedly built in the 1960's. We've "explored" here before but it's nothing exciting. The most interesting thing we've ever seen were wandering cows. At dark it looks pretty creepy around here. I have no idea why Stan wanted to meet here. He said that it's a surprise, so I hope it's worth it.

A lot of weird shit happens in this town, so I wouldn't say I'm crazy for half expecting something or someone to come jumping out from the trees at any moment. As the imaginary vision of a Snookie monster enters my brain, I pick up my pace and start dashing into the field, running towards the little building. I stop to catch a bitter breath once I reach it. Fuck, the dark makes everything seem scarier than it really is.

"Psst!" A voice calls.

"Agghhh!" I scream, startled. My heartbeat races and I jump nearly a foot in the air. _Thud, thud, thud_ goes my chest.

I look upwards to see that it's just Stan. He's looking down at me, chuckling loudly from the roof of this thing. "Jesus dude, don't do that to me!" I yell. I try to compose myself, which is pointless since he just saw me scream like a little girl anyway.

"Aww, are you scared?" he taunts, still laughing. OK, now I'm getting pissed. It's cold and late, we're in a frozen field and I just nearly had a heart attack. "Fuck you dude! This place looks creepy as hell at night. What did you drag us out here for?" I yell.

Stan's laughter dies down and he points at the ladder hanging off the brick wall. "Just come up here!" he says.

I sigh and start climbing my way up there. Even the steel ladder feels frozen, making my hands even colder than they were before. Now I regret not bringing gloves. I hop over the edge and make my way onto the flat top roof.

Stan's crouching down on the roof with his backpack. He unzips it and pulls out a fuzzy blanket. No, two fuzzy blankets. He places one down and sits on it, patting it for me to sit down as well. "C'mere," he says.

"What's this about?" I ask as I sit down next to him, legs criss crossed. He takes the other blanket and drapes it around both of us. I grab one end and pull it over my arms. It's the soft thick blanket he always keeps on his bed in the wintertime. I'm too thankful for the fuzzy warmth to care about the awkward closeness.

The blanket is big enough for both of us, but we had to scoot closer together to fit under it. And now the awkwardness is sinking in. Stan probably senses it too, because he starts laughing. His laugh is contagious because now I'm laughing as well. I don't even know why. I'm shaking, probably due to a combination of the laughter and the cold, and suddenly I fall over on my side, outside of our little blanket cocoon. We're both laughing so hard that Stan snorts, which just makes me laugh even harder. I try to pull myself together as I get back under the blanket.

"OK, can you tell me now what the fuck we're doing?" I ask for probably the third time.

He smiles at me as he readjusts his end of the blanket. In the faint moonlight, I can see the dimples in his cheeks. He's very popular with the girls at school, apparently they like his dimples. They're always pinching his cheeks. Hell, I'm tempted to pinch them myself.

"One sec." He grabs his back pack and pulls out a thermal mug, along with a pair of binoculars. He hands me the mug and puts the binoculars on the ground.

"What are those for?" I ask, taking a sip from the mug. The drink is still warm. It tastes like hot cocoa and..a faint taste of whiskey? Not really surprising, Stan likes to spike every damn drink with alcohol. I won't lecture him this time since he's being nice, and I just want to know what he brought me out here for.

"Alright, I brought you out here to see..a comet!" he announces enthusiastically, grinning widely.

"That's the surprise?" I say dejectedly. This surprise feels anticlimactic.

Stan's grin falters. He looks disappointed. "I thought you liked space stuff!"

"Yeah, but not as much as I like warm beds and sleep," I respond, feeling like an ass after I speak. He spent time to plan this, and I'm just being a dick. Oh well. I'm grumpy, tired and cold.

"Aww, come on! How often do you get to see a comet? It should be coming soon, and then we can go back to bed." Stan looks at his phone, reading a news article about the comet. "Should be seen between 1 and 2 AM," he reads. "Look towards the moon for a small, fuzzy flying ball."

"Let me see that," I say, as he hands me the phone. I sigh after looking at the date on the top of the page. "Dude! This is from the other day. According to this, the comet already appeared last night."

"Oh...really? Are you sure? I thought it was tonight!" I hand the phone back to him, and he reads the date. "Dammit." Stan's face sinks and he pinches his nose. I just smile at him and give him a pat on the back for his effort. "It's alright, bud." I shrug.

He just looks at me with the expression of a bewildered puppy. "Nah, I'm an idiot. I made you get out of bed for nothing. Sorry, man." He shakes his head, putting the binoculars back in his bag. "Guess we won't be needing these, then."

I just shrug again and look up at the sky. "Well, the sky does look nice, comet or not. Almost a full moon, pretty cool! And I guess this was an..interesting experience, walking out here at midnight. And then almost pissing my pants and having a heart attack when you scared me," I laugh.

Stan chuckles. "You looked like you were about to die."

I twitch, once again picturing a freaky orange creature with furry boots, jumping out of the woods to rape me. "It's South Park, you never know what to expect around here."

"Yeah, I know," Stan replies simply. And then, awkward silence. We're still sitting next to each other with the blanket around us, and just as I am about to stand up, Stan clears his throat. I remain still, assuming he's not ready to leave yet. I try not to groan. My nose is really cold and it burns.

"You know..the comet wasn't the only reason I wanted to see you tonight," he says quietly.

His apprehensive tone, combined with the mystery of his statement and fact that we're all alone, out in a dark field at midnight, makes me just a little bit uncomfortable. An imagined horror scenario flashes into my mind, where he's just murdered me. No one was awake or close enough nearby to hear my blood curdling screams in the night, and Cartman is helping him drag my partially frozen body into a ditch somewhere. OK, perhaps that's a bit far fetched. I mean, Cartman would probably be happy to murder me, but Stan would never do such a thing..right? Then again, the strange look that he's giving me causes me to question his true motives for dragging me all the way out here.

"Err..so what was the _other_ reason?" I ask, trying to keep calm as we sit huddled together. There is no space between us, but I don't want to be rude and scoot away. He's my best friend, we've always been close. Plus, it's not like anyone is around to see. But this all seems way more intimate than usual, especially considering that he purposely planned this.

He simply looks at me, and I steal a glance at him. In the darkness, I can dimly make out his smile. If I'm not mistaken, he looks nervous as well. He's just staring at me. Oh god. I feel a sensation in my throat, like I might puke. Funny, puking is usually Stan's thing. I consider getting up, but he grabs my hand before I can move away. I feel him caress it with his thumb.

I am now pretty certain where this is going, and unless he's going to tell me he has cancer and 90 days to live or something, I don't think I can handle it. Wait, no, not that I want Stan to have cancer. I'm just not sure how to react to the..other thing that this might be about. The thought of it is turning me into a ball of anxiety. I'm still partly sleepy, and this is very unexpected. If Stan is really trying to put the moves on me, then I have no idea how to behave or respond.

I stare down at our hands with my mouth slightly agape. My mind has completely forgotten about the bitter cold. Stan notices my reaction and frowns worriedly, removing his hand from mine.

"Um..sorry," he says flatly. "I didn't mean to...um..this whole idea was a bad one. God, I'm an idiot." Once again, he pinches the bridge of his nose, as he casts his head down. "We should just go home, before we freeze to death."

I let out a deep shakey sigh. "Stan..you're confusing me. Did you bring me here to tell me something important? If so, just tell me."

But he doesn't say anything. He looks like he wants to say something, but he's obviously afraid. I continue. "Alright, I don't know if you holding my hand and staring at me like that means that you're dying of terminal illness and don't know how to say goodbye, you're moving somewhere far away and hesitant to tell me, or if this is like, your shy way of trying to be romantic or some shit. I can't read minds."

Stan lifts his head slightly and looks at me through one eye, grinning slightly. He rubs the back of his neck. "Uh..the last one." He takes a deep breath. "My plan was to see that comet, and then I'd tell you about how if I could make a wish on a shooting star, I would wish...ugh..." he stops. He looks like he's ready to die from embarrassment.

I look at him suspiciously. "Stan, did someone make you do this as part of a bet? Was it Cartman??"

"No!" he responds, a little too eagerly. The look on his face seems genuine. "I just didn't know how to say it."

I'm shocked. I didn't even see this coming. I guess I should have. Stan has always seemed..quite sensitive and clingy, especially towards me. He's been attached to my hip this past year, so I should have known. I guess this means that he's into men. Wait, why didn't he tell me? And why is he just assuming I'd be into him, that I'm into guys? Maybe he really didn't think this through. He looks so embarrassed. I feel pretty bad.

"You'd wish..what?" I ask. I'm not dumb, I can easily figure out what he's trying to say, but I want to hear him say it, to make things clear.

He gives me the bewildered puppy look again. God dammit, he looks so cute when he does that. It makes me feel very protective, like I need to hug him to relieve his puppy sadness. He's turning me gay now with a single look. That's pretty impressive.

"That..um..that...youwouldbemine?" he mutters, looking away. "It was a terrible cheesy idea to ask you this way." Stan looks the most embarrassed I've ever seen him before. He even squirms under the blanket. Seeing this painfully shy side of Stan is empathy inducing. In an attempt to calm him down, I give him a hug. A kind of awkward, distant, pat on the back hug.

Instead of calming him down though, he seems even more upset now. He's not saying a word either, just staring down at the concrete we're sitting on. Now he looks like a kicked puppy. Was he expecting me to say yes and leap into his arms? Have I somehow unintentionally lead him on, simply by being so close to him as a friend? I know he wouldn't have confessed this to me if he didn't think there was a good chance that I like him back.

I guess it kind of makes sense. We've always had a "bromance", as people call it..we hug, we spend a lot of time together, we've told each other "I love you" so many times..I even kissed him once as a joke. Oh god, it's no wonder Stan assumed this all meant more than friendship.

He looks sad, and I hate seeing him look like that. Especially knowing that it's my fault. So without really thinking it through, I grab his chin and kiss him.

He stiffens like a board, but after a few seconds he is kissing me back. I peek open one eye and see that his eyes are closed. I look at the beautiful moon behind us, and then close my eyes as well. This would be like a fairytale scene if I even knew how to feel about it.

Aside from a little peck I gave Stan that one time on Halloween..I have never really kissed a guy before. But this actually feels..kind of nice. It definitely helps that Stan is not bad looking, even straight guys would have to admit it. And thank Moses, I think he mouthwashed and brushed his teeth before he came here. So did I, before bed. I can just vaguely taste the alcoholic hot cocoa he's been drinking. The kiss doesn't last long. By the time we break apart to breathe, I'm left feeling very confused.

It surprisingly didn't feel strange or sexual at all. I think if it were any other guy, I would be uncomfortable. But Stan is..different. I love him more than any of my friends. His vulnerable confession just made me feel even greater affection for him. I pull the blanket around us again and huddle next to him. He plants a single kiss on my head, and in return I grab his hand to plant a kiss on it. We hold our hands together under the blanket, trying to warm up. I don't know why I'm doing this. I don't even know for sure if I want whatever this might lead to. Right now though, it just feels nice.

And those are the exact words that leave my mouth. "This feels..nice," I say aloud. Even though my nose is still tingly from the cold, and my feet are beginning to feel numb as well, I'm able to ignore that and focus on him.

Stan smiles. "Look at the moon.." he nods up at the glowing sphere before us, still caressing my hands.

A smile tugs at my lips. "Yeah, it's beautiful."

"You're beautiful," he says in a quiet but strong voice, squeezing my hand. I feel my chest tighten. It is an odd feeling, having your long time best friend saying sappy things to you. I can't say that I hate it.

I turn to examine his face. He looks content, but I know that internally, he's probably riddled with anxiety. "That's a real compliment, coming from the best looking guy at school," I grin.

He looks surprised and smiles. It now occurs to me what an adorable smile he has. "You really think.. I'm the best looking guy?" he asks.

"Well, you're definitely a pussy magnet," I laugh. "I'm sure some guys are jealous of you. Hell, even I've been jealous of you. Come on, you know the girls think you're cute as hell."

"But what about you?" he grins. "Do you think I'm cute?"

I roll my eyes. "I'd be lying if I said I don't." He looks happy after I say that. "But why do you like _me_? You've got all these chick friends who obviously want you, dude. I guess this means you're gay?"

He fidgets nervously, and takes a deep breath. "...yeah, I think so. I didn't want to tell anyone. I thought..maybe you were too, but I was afraid to ask."

I'm a little shocked that he thinks I'm gay. I've never been attracted to any guys. I've always shown interest in girls. Why does he think I'm gay? It's been bad enough that ever since Cartman started those rumors, I've been dealing with the pressure of random people assuming I'm gay, and even worse, that I once had a childhood romance with the fat fuck. Eugh. I'm a little sensitive about the topic for this reason.

"What makes you think I could be gay?" I ask, sounding unnecessarily defensive.

Then I look down at our intertwined hands, and he seems to notice the irony of it too because he laughs. "Oh I dunno..maybe the way you just kissed me? Or maybe the way you're cuddled next to me right now? You haven't sprinted back home yet to wash the gay off and say fifty 'no homos'." 

I let out a simple, nervous laugh. I don't know what to say. As his friend, I have to be real with him. "Look..to be honest, I've never really thought about another guy in that way," I admit. He looks confused. "But..after you confessed to me, I just, I don't know. I love you, and you looked upset. I wanted to kiss you to make you feel better." After the words come out of my mouth, I instantly realize how shitty that sounds. I feel like a total dick, but I had to tell him the truth.

Stan looks away. Jesus, he looks like he's gonna cry. He pulls his hands away from me, looking off in the opposite direction. Wordlessly, he makes a move to get up. I grab his wrist, and he just looks at me, like he's definitely going to cry. Oh god, I think he _is_ crying. I hear him sniffle.

"Dude, don't cry! Look.." I try to hold his hand in comfort. "I'm just really confused right now. I actually did enjoy that kiss," I try to assure him.

Stan continues sniffling regardless. This is so very awkward. "Maybe," he sniffs, "we should get back to bed now. It's getting late, and, uh, I know you're cold."

I frown, but I guess he's right. It must be well past 1AM by now. And well, this has been an overwhelming experience for me. I'm sure for him too.

I nod silently as he puts his stuff away, and help him pick up the blankets. We throw them off the roof, and he climbs down the ladder first. I go after him, hearing the snow crunch under my boots as I jump off the second rung.

I look at him, just standing there, visibly upset. I open my arms out for a hug. He reluctantly approaches me and I squeeze him tight. As we pull away, I don't know what drives me to do it, but I lean in to kiss him again. I end up kissing his hat instead, after he turns his head away.

I go in a second time for a kiss and this time he just inches backwards from me. I feel like an utter idiot.

"I'm sorry," I apologize, rubbing the back of my neck awkwardly.

"Let's just get home," Stan mumbles.

We each carry a blanket and trench through the same path that I came in from. Nothing jumps out to kill us, but instead the anxiety building up in me is killing me. We don't really speak as we walk.

We eventually climb over the fence and silently continue our trek down the street, back to the street where our houses are. We both stop as we approach Stan's house. Before he can get away from me, I grab his shoulder. He turns and looks at me with that same bewildered expression again. It makes my heart quicken.

"Look, Stan..um..I don't know what to say. I'm really flattered that you like me so much. I just..need time to think about this," I say quietly, trying not to be heard by anyone.

Stan sighs and looks down. "It's okay Kyle. You don't have to think about anything, if that's not who you are. I can't just expect you to become gay."

I half smile at him. "Dude..we're only 17. I really don't know what I am. I do know that I love you..you're cute..and..I wouldn't mind kissing you again."

Stan looks embarrassed, but at least he's stopped crying. I've never seen him act like this around me before, it's a surreal change from his usual demeanor.

I lean in again, but stop myself because I realize he'll just turn away again if I try to kiss him for the third time.

I'm surprised though when he drops his blanket on the ground, grabs me by my jacket, and pulls me into his lips. I close my eyes and grab his arms to steady myself. Once again, this just feels...nice. It feels special because Stan and I are already so close. The thought that he has exclusive romantic feelings for me gives me unexpected butterflies.

We pull apart, and I examine his face. I can see it in his eyes. He really does love me. I watch as another tear escapes his wet eyes and rolls down his cheek. I brush it away with my thumb, and cup his face to kiss him again. It's just a quick chaste kiss. Stan gives me a sweet smile.

"Let's get some sleep," he whispers, moving to pick his blanket up off the icy ground.

"Ok. I'll help you carry this," I whisper back, before following him up the driveway to his house's side door. He stops in front of the door to retrieve his key, and I hand him the other blanket.

I feel an urge to kiss him again, but instead I hug him, causing him to accidentally drop the heavy blankets back on the ground. I laugh at the mess. I hope we haven't messed them up with all the times we've tossed them around tonight.

His arms tighten around my back and he rests his head on my shoulder, letting out a deep sigh. I plant one last tiny kiss on the side of his face. We let go, and I pick up the messy blankets off the ground to hand to him.

"Goodnight. I'll see you..tomorrow?" I whisper.

"Yeah, sure. Goodnight," Stan whispers back. I shove my hands into my jacket pockets and turn around to walk home. As I reach his driveway I look back and see him still watching me. I wave goodbye, and he waves back, before entering his house.

Well, I guess the surprise was definitely worth it.


End file.
